Locos stuck changing circuits

[Ralphy51]

Fishmanoz - ok sorry about that .

As for the suggestion about pickups I may have to do that but to be honest that doesn’t explain why one crossover is fine and the other one isn’t nor why the problem only occurs when moving from one HM6000 controller to another .

It feels more like an HMDC specific problem somehow but guess I’ve exhausted the options in the chat for the time being.

[Fishmanoz]

Ah, sorry. With the one controller but two channels, there is a common return between them that completes the circuit (see LT’s post).

If it’s 2 controllers, there’s no common return. Consequently, when the last loco wheel crosses the IRJ until the first tender wheel crosses it, you have two supplies each with only one connection so no power flow.

If you cross slowly, it will stop. If you go quicker, it will skid across the gap until the first tender wheel crosses and power is restored.

[Ralphy51]

Fishmanoz, LT and others , I believe that after taking on board your advice I now have a solution.

Yesterday I discounted the idea of having two circuits, connected without insulating fishplates, using HMDC controls as this seemed to create too many short circuits for the App based controls.

However, I revisited this option to see if I could understand the exact conditions that caused the shorts. I was well aware of the need to have the Motion controls for both circuits set in the same direction but this was still leading to shorts.

I tried matching the speed controls and sometimes this still caused shorts but if not , once the loco had competed the crossover, the speed seemed to be something like the aggregate of the two controls, so way too fast before being brought to a halt.

Apologies for the time it’s taken for me to consolidate all of the advice but getting my head around any differences between traditional analogue and the HM way hasn’t been easy for me

Anyway, what I have now established to make things work for me are these steps-

1) I removed the insulation between the two circuits that were sharing a different HM6000 unit

2) HMDC controls for both circuits must of course both be in the same direction.

3) Both points must remain closed until both slider speed controls are moved away from zero otherwise a short will occur.

4) I found that with the smallest movement of the slider (not even enough for movement) shorts are avoided

5) Control of the loco was best achieved by using the control from the start circuit brought to a stop in the destination circuit.

6) Ok then to close the points.

Thanks again everyone

[LTSR_NSE]

Excellent @ralphy thumbsup (glad we were able to offer help) - but it is great that you managed to make it work for yourself!